After finding a site behind the Backsons and the Leonard's we set up camp, optimizing the space available. It wasn't until we were fully set up (tent and van) a woman came and announced that we were too close to the edge of our site and we needed to be 1 metre from the edge of the camping site, no real reason was given except that the grey nomads next door didn't want to hear our noise. Although I'm not sure being 100cm from the border would create a noise barrier we did move it all, not before Nick had his say and measured exactly 1 meter from the boundary. We were infact at least 1/2 metre off the boundary to start with so one can only imagine Nicks delight and ability to keep his mouth shut at the prospect of winding up the caravan legs, pushing and maneuvering the van forward and up on to a chock, not to mention unpegging the tent and moving that too. And this was just our first taste of the acceptance (or lack of) of families paying to stay at Barn Hill Station.
With set up complete we headed down to the beach to watch the sun gracefully "plop" over the edge of the Western Australian coast. A few of the kids were ahead of us with Pete. As we met them a pale faced Josh exclaimed that he almost trod on a sea snake. Looking at his footprints in the sand "almost" was an understatement. That would could have been a disastrous if not deadly way to end the day. After recovering from this we all enjoyed the beauty of the Pindan sandy cliffs, a brilliant orange colour as the sun set in the distance. Truly a spectacular sight.
Our days were relaxed, kids enjoyed making shell animals, Zach and Ned went for a hike with Hamish to the Cairn which an explorer originally made (can't remember which one), Matt and Oli went for the same hike by themselves only to run home panting after coming eye to eye with some cattle, while Josh fished off the rocks for hours on end, only to get one catch, with 2 small fish on both hooks. Abbey loved playing with her "sister" Summer (well that's what she tells everyone ) and Ivy and Zach's favourite activity was finding the green frogs in the toilet blocks, even in the toilet bowl!
Oli celebrated his 11th birthday here and preparations were under way to celebrate with a BBQ and bare foot bowls tournament. However it took Hamish a while convince the oh so friendly booking host to allow us to
use the BBQ's even supplying our own gas bottles, and the Bowls greensman would not even entertain the idea of allowing the kids (even under close supervision) use the green, instead having to play on the uneven grass beside it. Luckily the kids didn't care, and had a great time perfecting the art of the bias and knocking each others balls away from the jack. And the BBQ was a huge success too, steaks cooked to perfection with delicious sides, not a bad way to celebrate a birthday while "on the road."
We are a few days ahead of our schedule and Broome booking, so after endless discussions about whether we would make it out to Cape Leveque in the territory and van, and deciding not to risk it, we opted for Quandong Point, a free campsite which Jo had been told was quite accessible.......
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